Independent readers responding to the assisted dying bill returning to the Commons shared deeply personal accounts of loved ones experiencing prolonged illness, dementia and end-of-life suffering, with many arguing that current law can prolong distress and deny dignity at the end of life.
The issue has returned to the Commons after Labour MP Lauren Edwards announced she intends to reintroduce Kim Leadbeater’s Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill as a private member’s bill.
The legislation, which would allow assisted deaths in England and Wales, previously passed the Commons by a narrow margin but fell in the House of Lords after sustained opposition and a large number of amendments aimed at strengthening safeguards.
The move has reignited political divisions, with supporters arguing it is a long-overdue reform to give terminally ill people more choice, while critics say the bill remains flawed and risks exposing vulnerable people to harm.
Among the responses, readers described witnessing relatives endure prolonged pain, severe illness and confusion at the end of life, with some saying patients can be left heavily medicated yet still suffering, and others warning the proposals could weaken protections for the most vulnerable and arguing instead for stronger palliative care.
Here’s what you had to say:
Loss of dignity
I am in a different situation. My wife has advanced vascular dementia. It came on before she was 60. She is in a care home. She no longer recognises anyone. She has no memory function at all. She cannot understand anything. She cannot say meaningful sentences. She cannot stand up or walk. She is doubly incontinent of both urine and faeces. All she does is sit in a chair. In short, she is a living vegetable with no quality of life I can understand or anyone is willing to explain.
She can only just use a spoon to eat and often eats with her fingers. If she doesn’t eat, the care staff spoon-feed her to keep her alive. I ask the care home to not spoon-feed her if she doesn’t eat of her own will. They refuse to listen to me and keep feeding her.
The system keeps her body alive, waiting for her vital organs to fail some time over the next year, or decade. I keep asking the doctors and social services to explain how it is in her best interest. No one is willing to say how. Yet they will not let her go. If I took her home, I would let her fade away with dignity.
Meanwhile, my life is absolutely awful. I have lost my wife and soulmate. I cannot grieve because the body is still breathing.
Meanwhile, various religious groups talk about the immortal soul and the sanctity of life.
TomHawk
This is a raw subject
My father in law died last week, in pain. All drugs at home, but nurses too scared to to use….. he didn’t want to have lost his marbles or die in pain. In the end both happened.
He often “jokingly” asked me, as someone in the medical field, to “sort him out” if he ever got in that state. I couldn’t, obviously, so had to, with my wife, her siblings and his wife of over 65 years, watch him struggling to breathe for three days in pain and distress.
The nurses who attended him were great, but assessing pain and agitation in some who is dying is difficult, and I had to argue to ensure he was given medication to reduce pain and distress.
This is quite a raw subject to me.
He was an intelligent and successful man in life who wanted to retain his dignity in death. This was removed from him. The current law around death needs revision. In cases like his, years in advance allow him to set a level where he feels his dignity would have been removed and allow him to pass in peace.
We treat animals with more dignity than we humans. And whilst we love our pets, they are not our husband, father, grandfather, wife mother or grandmother.
Pharmataff
Witnessing prolonged end-of-life suffering
Many years ago now, my grandmother died of dementia. Sitting for months in a chair, knowing no one, doubly incontinent. Sedated because she was angry and violent. She had been a strong woman; she wouldn’t have wanted this.
And I don’t want that for myself either. I live in Spain, and assisted dying is allowed, but not when the ability to comprehend has gone.
A notarised living will could allow for this.
But there are too many people opposed: religious objections, those who suggest it will be abused, and those who say we should improve palliative care. Why? When all joy and dignity has been replaced with misery and pain, why extend it when the outcome is inevitable? And, of course, how? Because painkillers strong enough to block the worst pain also end life if given in large enough doses.
Of course, that frequently used to happen: a little too much morphine given by a sympathetic doctor or nurse, but they dare not now.
A few years ago we met a couple in a restaurant and got talking. We started a friendship, but not long after we invited them to a small gathering in our home. She came but he didn’t; he had a back problem, a slipped disc they thought. Well, it wasn’t. He had bone cancer, and he died within about six months. Morphine didn’t stop his terrible pain, but it did make him too out of it to communicate properly. What an awful way to go.
I think many who oppose this, including those posting here, have never experienced a loved one dying in pain and misery.
nocomment
Too many loopholes
I sympathise, as my dad died of mesothelioma. It was a long and difficult death. He should have been able to pass peacefully at least 10 days before he did.
He was a carpenter, proud, independent, and worked far after retirement.
I myself have advanced MS, so for personal reasons I really wanted this Bill to pass.
However, I followed the progress of the Bill and was alarmed at how, firstly, it was rushed through the Commons.
MPs who were not sure were told that any problems they highlighted would be debated and rectified in the Lords.
I watched with dismay as the most common-sense safeguards put forward by the Lords were voted down by the committee.
I selfishly really wanted this Bill for myself, but there are too many loopholes that leave too many vulnerable people at risk.
Rubble
Public consent
Assisted dying is such an important life matter that could affect all our lives, so it needs to be put to a public vote in a referendum where all public and professional views can be heard openly in the public arena, and not made law through the back door of a Private Members’ Bill, which has already been rejected by the House of Lords and has not been supported by disability rights groups, the BMA or the Royal College of Psychiatrists.
This particular Bill is clearly flawed, so any attempt to push it through via the Parliament Act would be undemocratic and dangerous.
Astrogenie
Choice over end-of-life care
Approximately three-quarters (75%) of the British public support assisted dying in principle. This high level of backing spans the political spectrum and has remained consistent over the years, cutting across demographic boundaries including religious and non-religious groups.
This matter is for the individual. We should be allowed to choose how we die, just as much as how we live.
The problem with this issue is that it has been hijacked by MPs who are voting on their own views, rather than that of their constituents.
Nobody is requesting that it is forced on anyone, simply that it can exist as a choice for those who live in pain and suffering, and who have terminal conditions.
Silvafox
End-of-life distress
My dad is in the last few days to weeks; my mum is also heading that way. I am very convinced that if people could watch what I see multiple times a day, almost 100 per cent would agree that the law needs changing.
Lying in a bed in his lounge, in pain, unable to move, unable to eat, unable to pick up a TV remote. Unable to go to the toilet, and having to lie in your own mess.
All I ask is that government do what they say they do, and follow the science.
227detius
We are allowing continued suffering
Instead of reinventing the wheel, why don’t we just copy exactly the laws and rules of another country where assisted dying is already allowed and already working? Like Switzerland or the Netherlands, for example. I’m certain they would have had the same sorts of concerns and obviously developed an acceptable framework to make things work.
It seems crazy that we continue to allow people to suffer like this.
JoeNinety
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